Bridesmaid Lotto (12 page)

“Wow,” Calla said as I came out of my room, dressed and ready to go. “You look even better than the last time.”

“I’d better,” I said. “The last time I was just going to meet the girls. This is way more important than that.”

She nodded.

Mattie gave me his usual, “You look fabulous.”

I knew it was more a compliment to himself than me though. Not that I cared. If I had a talent like his, I’d worship myself too.

The buzzer went. And my bladder nearly did too.

“Oh my God, he’s here.”

~ 9 ~

“It’s Jake,” the voice said over the intercom.

I took a deep breath and pressed the talk button. “I’ll be right down.”

Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. This is it.

“You look beautiful,” Calla said.

“You’ll be marvelous,” Mattie added. “Just be yourself. I know I give you a lot of grief, but honestly, who could resist you?”

I gave him a hug and gave Calla one too. Normally we weren’t big huggers, but it just felt like a huggy kind of moment.

“Good luck,” Calla said as I stepped out the door.

I stopped at the stoop to attempt to calm down. I was actually shaking and had to take several deep breaths. Finally, I started down the stairs.

Thank goodness the boots were well worn in and easy to walk in. Mattie really was a genius.

“Hi,” Jake said as he flashed me his famous movie star smile.

“Hi,” I squeaked.

“You look wonderful,” he said.

“Thanks, you too,” I said. I think my face turned red. At least my voice had returned.

Sort of.

“Shall we?” he said and put his hand on the small of my back, leading me out the door.

“Sure,” I said and finally managed a smile. I could only hope he couldn’t feel me shaking.

“So, are you wondering where we’re going?” he asked.

“Yeah, I hope I’m dressed okay.”

“You’re perfect.”

Ooh. I like the way he said that, I thought. Not you look perfect, but you’re perfect.

I couldn’t keep the smile off my face.

“Well, I’m afraid I’m going to keep you in suspense just a little longer,” he said.

“Okay.” Frankly it didn’t matter what we did. I was just happy to be along for the ride.

We got into his car, and since I know absolutely nothing about cars, I couldn’t tell you what kind of car it was. Just that is was a little black sports car of some sort.

“So, I feel like I know a lot about you from your bio,” Jake said.

“Oh jeez.”

He chuckled. “Why do you say that?” he asked.

“Well, the thing is, I have no idea what is actually on that bio.”

“Oh right, you were saying your mother entered you in the contest.”

“Yeah. So embarrassing.”

“So you weren’t really out of town when she entered you, were you?” he asked with a bit of a smirk on his face.

I glanced at him sideways. “No,” I said and smiled, hoping he wouldn’t be offended.

He laughed a little harder. “Actually, I’m a little relieved that you said that. I mean the whole idea of the contest kind of freaked me out. And then the sheer amount of entries freaked me out even more.”

“So it wasn’t your idea?”

“God, no. My agent cooked it up.”

“So you’re not actually looking for a wife then?” I asked, looking out the window pretending not to be too interested in the answer, even though I was dying to hear what he was going to say.

“Well, not a wife really. Although I was being serious when I said I wanted to settle down. My life is insane. I’d like to just hang out and relax for a while. The only thing is, when there’s no one there to relax with, it’s just kind of boring.”

I smiled and nodded.

“So your mother? She must be something,” he said.

“You would not believe,” I said.

“Oh, you might be surprised. You should see my mother. The only reason I’m even an actor is because she pushed me so hard.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, she was totally one of those stage mothers that mouthed my lines along with me from backstage. She carted me from audition to audition when I was a kid.”

“Wow. That must have been interesting.”

He shrugged. “Not really. It was actually pretty boring. The same kids would be at pretty much every audition, which means the same mothers would be there too.” He rolled his eyes. “I think it had very little to do with the actual acting, it was more like the mother’s being in some sick little competition with each other.”

“Hmmm.” I didn’t know what else to say.

“But I guess I did learn a lot about acting in those years.”

I nodded.

“So what about your mother? Is she as meddling as mine?”

“Well, she did sign me up to be a Bridesmaid for a complete stranger, hoping to land me a man.”

He chuckled.

“My sister lives in the ‘burbs with her perfect husband and two perfect kids. I guess that’s what she wants for me too, although I’m not actually sure that my sister is all that happy out there.”

“Yeah. I can’t picture living in the suburbs, a bunch of kids running around, and trying to keep up with the neighbors,” he said. Then he changed to a feminine voice, “Oh honey, the Wilson’s redid the kitchen, perhaps we should remodel too?”

I started laughing. “The Johnson’s got a new SUV, let’s get a Hummer.”

“Right,” he said laughing with me. “Exactly.”

Jake pulled the car off the freeway.

“Are we going to the airport?” I asked noticing which off ramp we were taking.

“Yeah. You’re not afraid of flying are you?”

“No, but I am a little surprised.”

He laughed. Apparently my face showed the fact it was more like I was completely freaked out. What the hell? Was I being abducted? Although it is Jake Hall, would it really matter?

“Don’t worry, I’ll have you home by midnight,” he said smiling.

“We’re going to the airport and you think you’ll have me home by midnight?” I asked.

“Why, do you turn into a pumpkin or something?”

I chuckled. “No, but taking an airplane does not really seem like an ‘I’ll have you home by midnight sort of thing.’”

“Don’t worry, it’s a short flight.”

Oh my God. I’m going to be alone on a plane with Jake Hall. Wait a minute! I’m already alone in a car with Jake Hall. Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.

“Here we are,” he said pulling up to a small private plane.

“I’ve never been in a plane like this before,” I said.

“Don’t worry,” he said, sensing my nervousness. He put his hand on my hand. “You can ride up front with me. There’s really nothing like it.”

“Up front?”

“Yeah, I’ve got my pilot’s license.”

I raised my eyebrows. I could just picture the headline now, ‘Jake Hall in fiery crash with Bridesmaid.’ Oh God.

“Don’t worry; I’ve made this flight a hundred times.”

“Okay.” My voice was a little shaky.

He jumped out of the car and ran around the front. I couldn’t figure out what he was doing. So I just sat there.

He opened my door for me.

Wow, Jake Hall just opened my door for me.

“Thanks,” I said. He grabbed my hand to help me out. “I’ve never had a guy open a car door for me in my life.”

“Really? That’s horrible.”

“You’re quite a gentleman,” I said.

“Well I should think I should be, now that I’ve scared the living shit out of you,” he said winking at me.

I took a deep breath and suddenly felt very calm. Jake did not let go of my hand as he led me towards the airplane. He let me climb the stairs first.

God, I hope my butt looks good in these jeans, I thought.

The inside of the plane was luxurious. Exactly what you’d expect a movie star to fly in.

“Nice,” I said as he entered the plane behind me.

“Thanks, I just got it a few months ago. It’s kind of my new passion.”

“It’s really cool that you learned to fly. I mean obviously you could get someone to fly for you if you wanted.”

“Yeah, I suppose I could. But the best part of having a plane is being able to fly it. Once you get a taste for it, you’ll want to learn to fly too. I swear.”

I raised one eyebrow. “Somehow, I doubt it. I haven’t even driven a car in about a year,” I said.

“Really? How do you get around?”

“Subway, cabs. And when I go back home, I take the train.”

“That’s cool, I like to get out of the city every once in a while just to get out on the open road. But now that I think about it, I haven’t done much of that lately either. I usually just gas up the old airplane,” he said. “Geez, that sounds kind of high maintenance, doesn’t it.”

I laughed. “Don’t worry. If you’ve got the money, you may as well enjoy it, right?”

“The money
is
a bit ridiculous. I still can’t figure out why they pay me so much just to do a little acting. I mean, I don’t even work that hard.”

“Come on, not everyone can do what you do.”

“Well thanks,” he said looking at the ground. “It’s just that, you know, I do work hard at my job, but really, it’s not like I’m out there building houses or saving lives or anything.”

I shrugged. “Maybe. But neither are most of the rest of the people in the world.”

“I guess. Come on, let’s crawl into the cockpit,” he said.

“Um. Okay.”

“Don’t worry,” he said again, pulling me behind him.

Luckily it was a little hard to concentrate on the fact that I was scared about flying in such a small plane with him touching my hand the way he was.

But as soon as I was seated in the co-pilot’s chair and he let my hand go, my stomach began to tumble.

“You okay?” Jake asked.

I nodded vigorously. “Let’s just get this thing off the ground before I change my mind okay?”

“As you wish,” he said.

“I love that movie,” I said.

He raised an eyebrow at me.

“You know, Princess Bride, when Carey Elwes is always saying ‘as you wish’ to Robin Wright Penn. Or, I guess she was just Robin Wright back then.”

Jake stopped the fiddling he was doing with all the gauges and buttons. He turned to me and smiled. “I use that line all the time, and you’re the first person who actually knows where I stole it from.”

I turned red. “It’s one of my favorite movies.”

He cleared his throat and began fiddling again. “Me too. But if you tell anyone, I’ll deny it and of course make up hideous rumors about you.”

I looked at him, amused. “Well that’s a look into the life of Jake Hall now, isn’t it?”

He just grinned.

I was glad for the distraction. If he didn’t get this thing off the ground soon, I would definitely chicken out.

“Okay, here we go,” he said. The plane began to move.

I gripped the armrests and tensed up, pushing back as far as I could into my seat. The plane got faster and faster, and though I wanted nothing more than to close my eyes and scream bloody murder, I thought it might be a tad rude.

The plane lifted off and everything stopped shaking and got smoother, calmer. Even me.

“How’re you doing?” Jake asked.

“I’m okay. I’m actually okay. This isn’t so bad.” I leaned forward in my seat to get a better look out the front window.

He smiled. “I knew you’d like it.”

“Hmmm,” I said relaxing back into my seat. “So how long is the flight?”

“Just over an hour,” he said.

Aw, only an hour alone in the plane with Jake. A momentary flash of getting deserted on an island with Jake went through my head. Not that I wanted to crash or anything, but it might be nice be deserted with Jake, you know, just for a while.

“So are you willing to tell me where we’re going yet?” I asked.

“No,” he said, still smiling.

I let out a mock sigh and turned back to the window. Jake was busy flying the plane, and I was happy just to sit back and enjoy the ride. I was kind of wishing I could try to forget the fact that the man beside me was Jake Hall. I couldn’t shake the nervousness of being in the presence of a real live movie star. And a hot one at that.

Several minutes later, I could see a landing strip coming into view. I hadn’t even noticed we were descending. I started to get nervous about the landing, but Jake looked completely in control. His confidence gave me confidence.

It was as smooth a landing as I’d ever had and he pulled the plane off the runway toward the small terminal.

“Here we are.”